The present invention relates generally to fiber optics. More particularly, the present invention relates to optical backplane systems, as well as methods and devices associated with such optical backplane systems.
Optical fiber has been widely accepted as an interconnection medium for communication networks, due mainly to the advantages offered by fiber, such as higher bandwidths and better noise performance, as compared to electrical media. For example, an optical network can be used to optically connect any number of optical nodes of a system. For example, an optical network can be used to connect a plurality of processors for interprocessor communication.
An optical backplane system is a structure including a variety of connectors facilitating the interconnection and communication of different systems and components. Generally, the optical backplane system is configured for the interconnection of systems and components having high bandwidth optical interfaces. Conventional optical backplanes, however, also can include electrical connections and suitable interface circuitry for interconnecting systems and components having electrical interfaces.
Conventionally, optical backplane interconnects used in the optical backplane systems have been bundled groupings of fibers to form cables which are terminated at various optical connector components to provide backplane signal connections between various connectors (e.g., connectors at modules and/or input and output (I/O) connectors). More recently, optical backplane interconnects used in optical backplane systems have been made as thin high density nets of fibers on flexible substrate (e.g., optical fiber flexible ribbons or interconnects) which are terminated at various optical connector components to provide backplane signal connections between various connectors (e.g., connectors at modules and/or input and output (I/O) connectors). Such optical backplane interconnects may be combined using suitable connectors with electrically routed printed wiring boards (e.g., with appropriate optical to electrical interfaces).
The optical elements in such optical backplane interconnects have been static point to point solutions for providing interconnectivity between and amongst various optical fiber connectors used in the backplane system (e.g., point to point connection between modules mounted in a backplane system, or between module or modules and I/O connectors of the system).
Functionality (e.g., active or passive modulation of light in the fibers) provided to the optical backplane system is conventionally provided with use of functional optical devices (e.g., attenuators, splitters, etc.) that are connectorized and attached to a net of harnessed cable assemblies providing point to point connection. Such assembly is generally difficult and costly.
For example, in the case of adding splitter functionality to an optical backplane, the splitters are generally individually designed as a single input and a variety of outputs. Such individually designed splitters are terminated with connectors and attached to a net of harnessed cable assemblies. The count of splitters does not need to be very large before such connectorization and attachment becomes bulky and cumbersome to package. Further, manufacturing costs of adding such functionality to the backplane is generally high due to the need to provide individualized connectability between fibers of the interconnect of the backplane and the functional device (e.g., inputs and outputs of a splitter).